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50Error and Legal EpistemologyIn Deborah G. Mayo & Aris Spanos (eds.), Error and Inference: Recent Exchanges on Experimental Reasoning, Reliability, and the Objectivity and Rationality of Science, Cambridge University Press. pp. 376. 2010.
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49Put “proof beyond a reasonable doubt” out to pasture?In Marmor Andrei (ed.), The Routledge Companion to Philosophy of Law, Routledge. pp. 317. 2012.
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145Two dogmas of methodologyPhilosophy of Science 43 (4): 585-597. 1976.This paper argues that it has been widely assumed by philosophers of science that the cumulative retention of explanatory success is a "sine qua non" for making judgements about the progress or rational preferability of one theory over another. It has also been assumed that it is impossible to make objective, Comparative judgements of the acceptability of rival theories unless all the statements of both theories could be translated into a common language. This paper seeks to show that both these…Read more
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„A Confutation of Convergent Realism “in Yuri Balashov and Alex RosenbergIn Yuri Balashov & Alexander Rosenberg (eds.), Philosophy of Science: Contemporary Readings, Routledge. pp. 211--33. 2002.
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256Normative naturalismPhilosophy of Science 57 (1): 44-59. 1990.Normative naturalism is a view about the status of epistemology and philosophy of science; it is a meta-epistemology. It maintains that epistemology can both discharge its traditional normative role and nonetheless claim a sensitivity to empirical evidence. The first sections of this essay set out the central tenets of normative naturalism, both in its epistemic and its axiological dimensions; later sections respond to criticisms of that species of naturalism from Gerald Doppelt, Jarrett Leplin …Read more
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115Some problems facing intuitionist meta-methodologiesSynthese 67 (1). 1986.Intuitionistic meta-methodologies, which abound in recent philosophy of science, take the criterion of success for theories of scientific rationality to be whether those theories adequately explicate our intuitive judgments of rationality in exemplary cases. Garber's (1985) critique of Laudan's (1977) intuitionistic meta-methodology, correct as far as it goes, does not go far enough. Indeed, Garber himself advocates a form of intuitionistic meta-methodology; he merely denies any special role for…Read more
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47Reply to Mary HesseThe Monist 55 (3): 525-525. 1971.I am happy to see Dr. Hesse’s clarification of her earlier discussion of consilience. I shall not comment here on her interesting, if controversial, thesis that a confirmed theory confers no likelihood on its untested entailments, except insofar as the latter are analogous to previously confirmed entailments of that theory. It would be premature to comment on the thesis until Hesse has spelled out in more detail her account of analogy.
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32Views of progress: Separating the pilgrims from the rakesPhilosophy of the Social Sciences 10 (3): 273-286. 1980.
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75Dominance and the disunity of method: Solving the problems of innovation and consensusPhilosophy of Science 56 (2): 221-237. 1989.It is widely supposed that the scientists in any field use identical standards for evaluating theories. Without such unity of standards, consensus about scientific theories is supposedly unintelligible. However, the hypothesis of uniform standards can explain neither scientific disagreement nor scientific innovation. This paper seeks to show how the presumption of divergent standards (when linked to a hypothesis of dominance) can explain agreement, disagreement and innovation. By way of illustra…Read more
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The methodological foundations of Mach's anti-atomism and their historical rootsIn Peter K. Machamer & Robert G. Turnbull (eds.), Motion and Time, Space and Matter, Ohio State University Press. pp. 390--417. 1976.
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54A problem-solving approach to scientific progressIn Ian Hacking (ed.), Scientific revolutions, Oxford University Press. 1981.
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Progress and its problems: Towards a theory of scientific growthBritish Journal for the Philosophy of Science 32 (1): 57-71. 1978.
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78Towards a Reassessment of Comte’s ‘Methode Positive’Philosophy of Science 38 (1): 35-53. 1971.In this study of Auguste Comte's philosophy of science, an attempt is made to explicate his views on such methodological issues as explanation, prediction, induction and hypothesis. Comte's efforts to resolve the dual problems of demarcation and meaning led to the enunciation of principles of verifiability and predictability. Comte's hypothetico-deductive method is seen to permit conjectures dealing with unobservable entities
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316Science and Values: The Aims of Science and Their Role in Scientific DebateUniversity of California Press. 1984.Laudan constructs a fresh approach to a longtime problem for the philosopher of science: how to explain the simultaneous and widespread presence of both agreement and disagreement in science. Laudan critiques the logical empiricists and the post-positivists as he stresses the need for centrality and values and the interdependence of values, methods, and facts as prerequisites to solving the problems of consensus and dissent in science
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Hacking, Ian, "The Emergence of Probability: A Philosophical Study of Early Ideas About Probability, Induction and Statistical Inference" (review)Erkenntnis 13 (n/a): 417. 1978.
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64The Philosophy of Progress..PSA: Proceedings of the Biennial Meeting of the Philosophy of Science Association 1978. 1978.
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ComteIn Noretta Koertge (ed.), Complete Dictionary of Scientific Biography, Charles Scribner’s Sons. pp. 3--375. 2008.
Areas of Specialization
20th Century Philosophy |
General Philosophy of Science |
17th/18th Century Philosophy |
Areas of Interest
Philosophy of Law |
General Philosophy of Science |